October Surprises: Obama vs. Romney (2012)
In 2012, it looked as if incumbent President Barack Obama might be vulnerable and the Republicans could possibly retake the White House. He had used considerable political capital passing the Affordable Care Act in his first term, and in the mid-term elections, control of the House of Representatives changed from the Democrats to the Republicans. Although the President's party usually loses congressional, statewide and local seats in a midterm elections, the 2010 midterm election season featured some of the biggest losses for the president's party since the Great Depression. The Republican Party gained 63 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives, recapturing the majority, and making it the largest seat change since 1948. The Republicans gained six seats in the U.S. Senate, expanding its minority, and also gained 680 seats in state legislative races, to break the previous majority record of 628 set by Democrats in the post-Watergate elections of 1974. This left Republicans in control of 26 state legislatures, and 29 of the 50 State Governorships.
But going into the election, the Democrats had one significant advantage: while their nomination for president would not be contested, the Republicans would undergo a vicious battle, with whoever won coming out badly bruised politically. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney won the nomination, but had been severely attacked by the more conservative elements of his party.
When it became apparent that Romney would be the winner of the Republican race, Democrats were able to target their negative advertising against Romney, who was forced to focus on securing his party's nomination at the time, unlike his opponent. Romney was attacked for his record at Bain Capital, an investment firm that was criticized for increasing investor profits at the expense of middle-class workers who were laid off. Romney took a leave of absence from Bain Capital in February 1999 to manage the Salt Lake City Olympics, but ads from the Obama campaign falsely portrayed Romney as responsible for the activities of Bain Capital during that period. Romney's campaign cried foul and Romney personally demanded an apology, but the Obama campaign refused to do so.
In July 2012, Romney undertook an international trip as the presumptive nominee of the Republican party, visiting the United Kingdom, Israel, and Poland to meet heads of state, and also to raise funds. He experienced a number of gaffes on the trip, including comments critical of the readiness of the London 2012 Olympic Games. In Jerusalem, Romney discussed the possibility of a military strike against Iran with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres. Coverage of the trip by most news media was negative. His overseas tour took him to the United Kingdom, Israel, and Poland.
On August 11, 2012 Romney officially announced Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan as his choice for Vice President. The 2012 Republican National Convention was held from August 27-30. It featured notable appearances by Ann Romney, Chris Christie, Paul Ryan, Clint Eastwood, and Mitt Romney. While Romney's overall polling gains from the GOP convention were modest, the convention did improve his "likability" rating, but President Obama received a larger bounce in his favor after the Democratic convention.
On September 11, 2012, the U.S. diplomatic missions in Cairo, Egypt and Benghazi, Libya were attacked. In her initial remarks to the press, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated, "I condemn in the strongest terms the attack on our mission in Benghazi today." Romney released a statement saying, "It's disgraceful that the Obama Administration's first response was not to condemn attacks on our diplomatic missions, but to sympathize with those who waged the attacks." By the following day, it was confirmed that the U.S. ambassador to Libya had been one of several Americans killed in the Benghazi attack. In a televised press conference and an interview, Romney said that the administration had been wrong to sympathize with the attackers and apologize for American values rather than to condemn the attackers' actions. Romney's remarks were widely criticized for appearing to try to gain political advantage from a national tragedy.
On September 17, Romney suffered an early "October surprise" when excerpts were broadcast from a video recorded on hidden camera. The video was published by Mother Jones and it showed Romney speaking at a private $50,000-a-plate fundraiser held at hedge fund manager Marc Leder's mansion in Boca Raton, Florida. The magazine learned of the video from James Earl Carter IV, a Democratic opposition researcher (and a grandson of former U.S. president Jimmy Carter). Scott Prouty, a bartender at the event, later revealed himself as the videographer. In the video, Romney responded to a question about his campaign strategy, making the following statement:
“There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That's an entitlement. The government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what. And I mean the president starts off with 48, 49, he starts off with a huge number. These are people who pay no income tax. Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax. So our message of low taxes doesn't connect. So he'll be out there talking about tax cuts for the rich. My job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives. What I have to do is convince the 5-10% in the center that are independents, that are thoughtful, that look at voting one way or the other depending upon in some cases emotion, whether they like the guy or not."
Here is a YouTube video of the remarks:
Click to viewThe Obama team quickly made the audio recording the center of a swing-state ad blitz that aired through October. In an interview with David Letterman shortly after the clip surfaced, President Obama quipped, “My expectation is that if you want to be president, you've got to work for everybody, not just for some.” Four months after the election, Romney told Fox News’ Chris Wallace in an interview four months after the election. “There’s no question that hurt and did real damage to my campaign.”
It looked as if Romney might rebound from the remarks. In his first general election debate against Obama on October 3 in Denver, Colorado on domestic topics, polls shortly after the debate, most people believe Romney did significantly better than Obama in the debate. Subsequent public opinion polls showed the debate had eliminated most of gains in the polls that Obama had made over Romney after the two parties' national conventions.
The second presidential debate was a Townhall on October 16. During the second debate, Romney was perceived to have struggled compared to his previous performance. Most polls found that the majority of voters believed Obama had done better. The third and final debate between Romney and Obama was held two weeks before election day, on October 23 in Boca Raton, Florida. Once again, more viewers felt Obama had won the debate according to polls.
As the election hit the home stretch, Hurricane Sandy hit the New England coast a week before the election. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, who was previously believed to be one of Mitt Romney's leading supporters, gave Romney's opponent a boost when he praised President Barack Obama and his reaction to the hurricane and toured storm-damaged areas of his state with the president. Christie shared photo ops wit Obama, making it appear that Christie was now endorsing Obama. According to Karl Rove and Bill Clinton, the hurricane and its aftermath ended up helping Obama. It drew attention away from the campaigns and made Obama appear both bipartisan and "presidential". This was the final October surprise for Romney.
On November 6, 2012, Obama was re-elected for his second term as President of the United States. He won 332 electoral votes, two states short of his 2008 victory. Obama won 26 states and the District of Columbia, while Romney won 24 states. Obama received 65,915,795 votes (51.1%) while Romney received 60,933,504 (47.2%).